Joanne Bernard says, according to departmental numbers,
about 22.5 per cent of children in care are aboriginal, but only 2.7 per
cent of the population in Nova Scotia is of aboriginal ancestry. (CBC)
Nova Scotia's minister of community services says she's
concerned about the disproportionate number of aboriginal children in
community care.
For the first time in eight years, Department of Community
Services ministers met to discuss social issues, the most worrisome
perhaps being the high numbers of aboriginal children in care.
Joanne
Bernard, Nova Scotia's minister of community services, worries the
federal government is not doing more to help provinces with this
problem.
Joanne Bernard says,
according to departmental numbers, about 22.5 per cent of children in
care are aboriginal, but only 2.7 per cent of the population in Nova
Scotia is of aboriginal ancestry.
"It’s clearly an issue in this province," Joanne Bernard told CBC’s Information Morning.
"There are all kinds of issues of why aboriginal children are
taken into care, just like there are of all children taken into care. In
my personal experience, and the work that I used to do, you can't look
at the issues surrounding children in care, unless you look at the
vulnerabilities of families, especially the mothers. We all know of the
ongoing vulnerabilities and complexities that aboriginal women in Canada
[face] today, including in our own province."
In Manitoba the numbers are even higher. Seventy-eight per cent
of children in care in that province in care are of aboriginal descent.
According to 2013 figures from Statistics Canada's first National Household Survey showed that 16.7 per cent of the province's population identified as aboriginal.
Bernard is back in Nova Scotia after sitting down with
ministers in charge of social services from across the country in
Calgary late last week.
She worries the federal government is not doing more to help provinces with this problem.
"That collaboration starts with coming to the meeting of, quite
frankly, the social policy leaders of the country. So when you have
everyone of us at the table and you don’t have your federal counterpart,
clearly a piece of the puzzle in moving forward and addressing all the
intersectional issues that surround aboriginal children in care — in
addition to aboriginal women, it’s just so pivotal that that partnership
not only be maintained but strengthened," she said.
The provincial community services ministers last met in 2006.
Not just in Canada...Trace/Lara
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